


Orange Juice

by albionsbellatrix, Cerrone



Category: Wentworth (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-08
Updated: 2016-06-08
Packaged: 2018-07-13 20:50:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,359
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7136579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/albionsbellatrix/pseuds/albionsbellatrix, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerrone/pseuds/Cerrone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I hope you enjoyed reading! Leave me a comment about what you'd like to see happen in the next chapter :)</p></blockquote>





	Orange Juice

Breakfast had always been her favourite part of the day. 

Before Wentworth, she would spend her mornings with a steaming cup of tea making breakfast for Debbie before she caught the bus to school. The dawning sun would cast beams through her faded curtains, throwing the room into an indigo light. The warm and comforting smell of toast and eggs would fill the air and rouse her daughter from bed. She never thought of it then as anything especially precious. Of anything worth exalting. But things had changed. Everything had changed. Bea Smith no longer rose early to make her daughter toast and eggs. Bea Smith was drawn out of bed every morning by a speaker on the wall calling H-Block to breakfast. It had all been so normal, but this was her normal now. Every day the same food, the same table. The same women. Every day the same routine. 

Breakfast each day was like the uneasy silence before the storm. She could sense the fights before they happened. The women would seem restless. On edge. She could hear the thunder breaking over a not-so distant horizon. And it was always heading her way. She felt like an old jetty lashed over with endless waves. Day in and day out. But she was top dog, and it was her duty to clean up the mess the women made of each other. 

For now, at least, the day hadn’t started. She was free, as free as a prisoner can be, to eat her cereal and drink her watered-down orange juice. It had been so long since she’d had the real stuff. Not this powdered mix. The women were all bat-shit over their conjugal visits and all Bea wanted was some real fucking orange juice out of a real glass. Everything in the dining room was made of plastic. Plastic chairs. Plastic trays. Plastic cutlery. The screws said it was to stop the violence. That prisoners couldn’t be trusted with metal spoons and forks. But that hadn’t changed anything. She’d still stabbed Jacs Holt in the neck with a pen. Spiteri had still jammed a pencil in her eye, after The Freak got to her. 

Bea dropped her plastic spoon and sighed. She was tired. Frustrated. Being top dog in Wentworth was exhausting. She had to monitor every woman in the prison. Know what they were up to. Know who their enemies might be. Even from inside her cell Bea was a better governor than Vera. Maybe with a few less keys and arses to kiss. Every time she laid eyes on Channing he was swanning around the place with an insufferable look of self-satisfaction on his face. Like Wentworth was something to be proud of. 

She was sick of the junkies. Sick of the hot shots. Sick of fresh arrivals thinking they could run the place one week into their stay. Bea was top dog. And it was her way or no way at all. Maxine and Booms were her heavy guns. They were loyal. Not that she needed their help to be top dog. She clawed her way up the ladder by being ruthless. It wasn’t just because her hair was red that the women called her as such. She had the sentence to prove it. 40 years in this concrete shithole. It was exhausting. 

Turning her gaze away from her tray Bea looks up and sees Kaz and her crew walk through the door. Kaz Proctor was insufferable. Her blind loyalty to a cause was going to get her in deep shit sooner rather than later. She knew how to rile up the women and get them on side, but she didn’t have the muscle to back it up. Kaz was good at talking, it took her no time at all to spread rumours about her and Mr. Jackson. But now she had The Freak in her unit. Playing her for a fool and she had no idea. Ferguson would drive them all to self-destruction eventually, and they wouldn’t know it until it was too late. Bea had already played The Freak’s game once.

Walking behind Kaz, Bea sees Allie. She watches quietly as Allie’s eyes filter across the dining room until they find her own. 

Allie smiles. 

Bea smiles back. 

She was a strange person. Seeming to have come out of nowhere, as most people did in prison. But Allie was different to all the other women. She seemed unaffected. Like she didn’t even notice the storm clouds perpetually brewing in Wentworth. Bea wasn’t sure if she envied her or pitied her. Allie seemed nice enough. She didn’t take much to heart, and was less fervidly militant than her slightly older counterpart, thankfully. Even from half the room away Bea can still see the mark on Allie’s forehead where she had smashed it against the bathroom tiles. Bea felt a rush of guilt. Their episode in the shower had rattled her. She knew how to handle violence, threats, junkies, whoever. But she didn’t know how to handle affection. And she certainly didn’t know how to handle sex. 

Bea was so oblivious. Maxine had pointed it out. ‘She likes you.’ She saw Allie as a line to Kaz. A way to get information. But more and more Allie seemed like the only sane one in the whole place. Maxine was distant. Doreen was needy. Boomer was going on about babies all the time. Juice and the boys were constantly putting pressure on her to play the part of top dog. Allie just wanted a fucking cut and colour, and she didn’t even ask for it. It was refreshing. More and more it felt like Allie was the only one who actually gave a shit about her. Bea Smith. Not top dog Bea Smith. Not double murderer Bea Smith. Just plain Bea Smith. 

Allie had shown her tenderness. Stroked her cheek. Made her feel things she hadn’t felt in a very long time, or maybe ever. The gentle quickening of her heart beneath her chest. It had been a whole separate life where people had given her compassion. People had looked at her as more than just a killer. A top dog. A prison runt. People had looked at her then like Allie does now. And for now it was enough for Bea to simply watch Allie walk into the dining room and smile at her. Allie was a reprieve from everything she hated about Wentworth. 

Bea watches Allie for a time. Watches her eat her breakfast like it wasn’t the same boring shit every day. Like it wasn’t the same god awful chairs that hurt your back to sit on. Like her meal wasn’t served on a plastic tray. Bea was about as fresh as the orange juice they served for breakfast. Franky told her once that it was made from powder in bags. But Allie was like the real thing. Fresh. It wasn’t her first time in prison but somehow she had learned to cope with it far better than anyone else in Wentworth. Including herself. 

Bea watches as Allie stands and walks over to the table where inmates are allowed to make tea and coffee. She watches the easy float as she walks from one end of the room to the other. Pushing her plastic tray away Bea stands and walks towards where Allie is standing. She feels expectant eyes on her as she walks by the tables of women. Allie doesn’t notice her standing there until she speaks. 

“Make me a cup too.”

Allie smiles, unflinching, still looking down at what she was doing. “Say the magic word.”

Bea smirks to herself. Allie’s gentle challenges were like a breath of fresh air. She had no care about prison politics. And maybe Bea doesn’t mind that so much. 

She leans in close to Allie. Turning her shoulder inwards to block her voice from the women behind at their tables. “…please.” 

“How do you like it?” Allie turns to Bea, smiling still. 

“I have a feeling you might already know.” She holds Allie’s gaze. The woman’s eyes linger on her lips. 

“Black, two sugars, right?”

“Perfect.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed reading! Leave me a comment about what you'd like to see happen in the next chapter :)


End file.
